EDITORIAL - Think food security

According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations, both lives and livelihoods are at risk from the COVID-19 pandemic.

When it comes to the matter of food security, the FAO points out what we all know – and that is we risk a looming food crisis unless swift measures are taken to protect the most vulnerable, keep global food supply chains alive and mitigate the pandemic’s impacts across the food system.

“Border closures, quarantines, and market supply chain and trade disruptions could restrict people’s access to sufficient/diverse and nutritious sources of food, especially in countries hit hard by the virus or already affected by high levels of food insecurity,” the FAO points out.

They however assert that there is no need for the world to panic, since globally there is enough food for everyone. However, the FAO makes it clear that policy makers around the world need to be careful not to repeat the mistakes made during the 2007-2008 food crisis, and turn this health crisis into an entirely avoidable food crisis, even though the global food system will be tested and strained in the coming weeks and months.

Here in Barbados, it appears that the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security has been giving some thought to the whole matter of food security, in light of a crisis. The Ministry of Agriculture, in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organisation, recently hosted a presentation on “The Sweet Potato Value Chain”. It was during that event that Deputy Chief Agriculture Officer, Leslie Brereton, explained that given the threat of the coronavirus, Ministry officials mapped out the Sweet Potato Value Chain initiative to point the way forward for Barbados in the area of crop production and food processing.

The Ministry, he noted, considered what could occur if Barbados was unable to have food imported into the island, for whatever reason, and had to come up with a plan in a very short time to look at short-term, medium-term and long-term crops that could be grown to feed the population during times of crisis. They have started with sweet potato and its value chain, given that it is one of our main staple crops. They will also be looking at others very soon, if they have not started already.

Now given the whole COVID-19 pandemic and the challenges it is throwing up, we certainly need to think seriously about food security. If and when the pandemic is over, it may also be wise to put systems in place to ensure that our local farmers have more support in growing the foods we need here on island, to ensure that even if another pandemic does not hit, but a natural
hazard does, we can sustain ourselves food wise.

We can no longer look to the international players to aid us or bail us out of these situations, since as we are seeing with COVID-19, in some cases, it is every man for himself. Thus, there are some lessons which we will have to learn, whether we wish to or not, as this pandemic affects our island.